Madame Lise Talbot Barré, Consul General of France in Pondicherry and Chennai was present to welcome each of the 70+guests to the evening that started with the protagonist of the evening- the Beaujolais Nouveau (naturally of 2022 vintage)- a fruity and tasty wine that was of better quality than most of the wines served at such events. What followed soon were the accompaniments- excellent finger foods from Bakers Street, a well- known local French bakery that validated the oft held view that Pondicherry has excellent French bakeries that put similar bakeries in the metro cities in India to shame.

There was a short session of welcome speeches by Madame Barré after which Dr. Satish Nallam, President of Alliance Française of Pondicherry which had collaborated with the Consulate to jointly organise the event, talked about the event, profusely thanking the Consulate for collaborating with the organisation that promotes all things French. He also singled out Ravi Viswanathan, Chairman of Grover Zampa Vineyards, Cav. Subhash Arora, and Chinmaya Arjun Raja from Singapore, Delhi and Chennai respectively, welcoming them to join the hosts on this important day. I found it rather amusing to find a majority of locals talking in French, but it seemed to be the language de rigueur at the Consulate.

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The concept of Beaujolais Nouveau est arrivé originated in 1952, when the third Thursday of November was designated as the Beaujolais Nouveau Day. Since then it has gained popularity in many countries around the world, especially in the USA and Japan. It did see its rise in the 1990’s and 2000’s in the Indian metropolitan cities when the French Embassy used to collaborate with Air France to bring these wines by air. Unfortunately, it seems to have slowly decreased in popularity. In fact, a few guests claimed that this year only Pondicherry saw the event take place; the honours shared by the French Consulate and the Alliance Française in the city.

This vin de Primeur, helps farmers and winemakers unlock part of the investments and bring liquidity for their survival. The 55 kms long Beaujolais is just north of Lyon and south of Burgundy to which it once belonged as a wine region. Using Gamay, the poorer and earlier ripening cousin of Pinot Noir, produces light, easy drinking young wine, low on tannins and high on fruit, especially banana flavours, without any complexity to talk about or the need to critique the wine.

Interestingly, Georges Duboeuf, the controversial king of Beaujolais wines who was a big promoter of Beaujolais Nouveau Day (Duboeuf died in January 2020 leaving a legacy behind), which produces about four million bottles of Beaujolais Nouveau annually and is a very powerful négociant and Beaujolais producer, reportedly negotiated a deal with the

French government to allow an early release of the wine to enable him to use ships rather than planes to transport across to the U.S. He is known to have shipped these wines to India too in the early 2000’s through Beaujolais Nouveau Day he then importer, Fine Wines N More.

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Beaujolais Nouveau has a special significance for Indian Wine Day which was started in 2017 by Subhash Arora and the Indian Wine Academy with the support of the Lalit Hotels. The date for the inaugural event was selected as 16 November, the same day as the Beaujolais Nouveau Day which fell on the same date, being the third Thursday that year. The next two years he chose the same date as Friday and Saturday fell on the day. Following this the fairly well-established event was made permanently on 16 November as the Indian Wine Day.

Dinner served soon after was more Indian food in Pondicherry style, perhaps an amalgamation of different styles and was served by DeBussy Restaurant, another example of the local gastronomy.

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The event was covered by the local media with Le Petit Journal making it a point to thank the three gents from outside Pondicherry coming specifically for this fun day with pleasurable wines.

Subhash Arora

Le Petit Journal